I was delighted, this weekend, to hear that my colleague, Simon Marsh, and the chair of our Conservation Committee of trustees, Dr Andy Brown, both received awards in the Queen's Birthday Honours List.
Simon (our Head of Planning) received his MBE for services to local government while Andy's CBE (until recently Deputy Chair of the Environment Agency having previously run English Nature and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee) was for services to the environment. I cannot think of two more worthy recipients. Neither have ever sought the limelight but both have used their expertise, pofessionalism and powers of persuasion to make a difference for wildlife and the environment.
These are qualities shared by another colleague, Sam Fanshawe, who runs the Marine Conservation Society. Last week in Stavangar in Norway, Sam was presented with the Rachel Carson prize for her outstanding contribution to marine conservation. As Harriet Meade wrote in her One Big Thing for Nature blog post last week, it is right to take time to celebrate conservation achievements. And Sam, will be pleased to know that I am currently on Colonsay visiting our team leading our Seabird Tracking And Research (STAR) project.
STAR is continuing the work started by the EU funded FAME programme (Future of the Atlantic Marine Environment) and seeks to find out more about the needs of seabirds to inform protected area designation and guide smart development at sea. This work continues to radically alter our understanding of seabirds such as razorbills who we now know might travel up to 313km for one fishing trip. This is about the distance from my home in Cambridge to my wife's family in Newcastle. That's a hell of a long way to go for one fishing trip. I am looking forward to seeing what we are up to and hopefully see a bit of wildlife as well...
The context for my trip though is a little more miserable. I remain dismayed about the pace of establishment of the marine protected area throughout UK waters.
This is the One Big Thing we still need in the marine environment. Last week we joined forces with Sam's MCS, WWF, Wildlife and Countryside Link and The Wildlife Trusts to hand in over a third of a million pledges to the Prime Minister. We are urging him to inject urgency into the designation process so that we have more than just the 31 Marine Conservation Zones proposed to date.
This lack of ambition is shared by the Welsh Assembly Government where they have had to go back to the drawing board with their designation process. Legislation to establish MCZs in Northern Ireland is due to be completed any day now. While, here in Scotland, home to nearly half of all breeding seabirds in Europe, with the exception of black guillemots, seabirds have been largely ignored in the process of identifying Scottish Marine Protected Areas.
Throughout this summer, the Scottish Government is running a consultation process, asking which sites in Scottish seas should be designated as MPAs. We will respond to this consultation to ensure that seabirds, and the sandeels they depend upon for food, get the protection they deserve. We'll continue to do what we can to remove the treacle from the systems across the UK and STAR should help ensure we have the best evidence to establish marine protected areas to safeguard important foraging areas for our seabirds.
Splendid! Well done! You CAN do it!